Cupcake Explosion

Our house is old, and the floors make a lot of noise when we walk on certain parts of them. This is especially true in the nursery of all places. Each night after I nurse sleepy Vivian I strive to keep from waking Master Henry. I swear that every single night when I place the baby in her bed and exit the room I imagine one of those high-tech bank or art museum robberies with laser light motion detectors and alarms. You've seen those movies. The characters crawl, bend, flip and hang from ropes to get in and out of the room as they avoid the light beams. I have a specific path I follow to leave Henry and Vivian's room in the quietest manner possible. It involves stretching my legs to step over the ottoman. At least I get to amuse myself by imagining I'm in a movie in the wee hours of the night.

Vivian is getting so beautifully plump. She fits into my lap while she nurses in the coziest way, and I can barely stand how fast she's growing. She looks into my eyes so adoringly, and she's just a fabulous baby girl. Two nights ago Robbie and I went out for a date night to a rooftop party at the Royal's game. As I entered the living room Henry looked up and said, "Oh, Mommy so cute!!" That little boy made my day. The baby wouldn't take her bottle for Lauren and Mrs. Scarboro that evening, and she was still awake when we got home at almost 11 pm. They said she was happy enough, just awake. Well, she was fed and put to sleep, and she didn't wake up until 7:16 am! She hasn't slept through the night since she was 6 weeks old. She's nearly 4 1/2 months, so I've had little sleep for a good many weeks. However, our toilet was running, and the sound woke me up during the one night when Vivian did not wake up. Rats!

Henry has been his usual busy self. I am convinced that if the house falls silent while Henry is home and awake, then he has succeeded in his plot to obtain a toothpaste tube to suck. I found him in our bathroom with a stool from his sisters' bathroom reaching for our tube the other morning. He got a Sam's size jar of cayenne pepper that we purchased for the garden to ward off squirrels, and he was trying to open the giant thing. Can you imagine how that blog entry would have gone? Henry has really entertained me lately with some of his quips. He saw me double pumping breastmilk yesterday for the first time. He walked into the bedroom. He leaned toward the cone shaped piece that fit against my body. He then said, "Oh, Mommy. That so funny." He's right. It is very funny. My friend told me that her oldest was convinced that one side yielded white milk and other other chocolate. She went with it.

I'm still on the pursuit of my pre-Vivian physique. To change up my workout I used one of Robbie's P90X DVDs called Plyometrics. It is very hard. The leader is a man, and Henry is used to seeing women on my workout videos. He knows my routine, and when he sees me put on my exercise clothes he says, "Mommy do workout." He stood in the living room with a totally perplexed look on his face as he listened to the instructor guide me through the moves. This dude has a lot of personality...much more over the top that I like, and Henry had a furrowed brow and odd expression on his face for many minutes. It was hilarious. My legs are still in pain, so if you need a tough workout, then check out P90X.

Yesterday Robbie and I went to the final day performance of VBC. I managed to arrive early enough, by some miracle, to sit in the front row. Robbie arrived, and we were directly in front of Evelyn during her songs. She was so shy and cute with her sign language to the songs. It was fun. Afterwards snacks were provided. This was a joke. They served cupcakes that although gorgeous, were piled with 2 1/2 inches of swirled white icing. I had no camera. I always have a camera at those things, and I end up in the back with pictures of some grandpa's bald head, instead of a close-up of my child. I needed a camera for cute Ev and messy Henry. He pretty much covered the lower portion of his face with white icing. As he tried to eat the white cupcake it disintegrated all over the 2 foot radius surrounding him. Imagine a cupcake bomb exploding and you'll envision the right picture. You should have seen the looks on the faces of people watching Henry eat. He had crumbs ground into his shirt, pants, the rug below, and his arms were smeared with stickiness. I think Robbie was furious with me for giving Henry such a messy treat, but he just left the building with the screaming baby and an irritated look. One friend burst out laughing it was so bad, but then she said, "I'm so sorry. Rather than laugh at you, how may I help you?" She brought napkins, and I went to work with all of the baby wipes that were in my possession. The hunk keeps life interesting. Sometimes he gets to dirty that he actually asks for a bath.

Robbie worked a half day, and I asked him to take the two little ones home for naptime to allow me to take the big girls to a learning toy store. They deposited the vast majority of their spring birthday money in their bank accounts, and I left them with a sum for shopping fun. You should have seen them in that store. They looked at every single item and boy did they deliberate. Evelyn's final decision was for an awesome real metal mini shopping cart. I wanted one for Olivia when she was just one, but we never got one. I added some money to Ev's allowance to enable her to make the purchase. I figured it would be money well spent with Henry and Vivian following her in the family line. I was right. Henry thinks this cart is the coolest thing he has ever seen. However, I keep hearing at near scream level, "MY TURN!!!" Evelyn said, "Mommy, you are going to have to go back to Learning Tree and buy another cart for Henry." No, they have to share. They are going to have to work on their sharing, because the process isn't going very well.

I took the girls out for lunch after we shopped. Olivia said, "Mommy, is it appropriate to talk about private things in restaurants?" Loaded question. "Do you mean private parts, or private things, Honey?" She told me she meant private things. "That's fine. Just speak quietly." She went on to ask if it is embarrassing to get married in front of a lot of people and kiss your new husband. Then she blushed. I told her it is wonderful since a wedding is much like a birthday party in that you may invite the people in your life who are most special to you. She liked that answer.

I'm pleased to say that I was able to write this entry while my darling husband prepared a wonderful egg breakfast. I think we'll head to the pool soon and enjoy some summertime family fun.